Sure enough, the beagle eventually veered off the street, crossed a front lawn, and perched on the stoop of a white split-level home. There, its annoyed bark gave way to a defensive growl.

HAS worked in animal con- trol for 15 years and he knows a few tricks. Herding a dog home is only one of them.

He got out of the wagon and tried to slide a leash on the beagle, but the dog scurried away, never leaving the yard and never ceasing the low growl. Finding nobody at home, Gossele interviewed a neighbor to confirm that the dog be- longed at the white split-level.

After that, it was easy to get the own- er s name from the mailbox-which is

where he put a $10 citation for violating Glenview's leash law.

Getting back into the wagon, Gossele resumed his patrol through the subdivi- sion. The beagle, still free and growing smaller in the rear view mirror, watched the wagon vanish around a curve, perhaps thinking she won the chase.

"It could be that both the man and wife work and let the dog run all day. That bothers me when it s this (5 degrees) cold," he said.

Gossele, for all his tricks, is a dog lover.

"I NEVER blame any dog," he con- , "They're always the victims. People get a ticket and they scream at the dog like it s his fault. Makes you wonder."

Ask Gossele and he will tell you that animal control is growing into one of the most demanded municipal services - right up there next to street repair and garbage collection.

or ask suburban officials.

The National League of Cities surveyed mayors and city managers across the country four years ago, asking what citi- zens complain about most. Dog control topped the list.

Only last week a local health planning agency released the results of a survey it

conducted in suburban Cook and Du Page counties. Asked to choose the public health service they are most dissatisfied with. 13 per cent of the 1.100 residents surveyed circled dog control. The next highest item on the gripe list, garbage collection, rankled fewer than 5 per cent of the respondents.

EVEN SO. Gossele says, many suburbs aren't taking dog control seriously. Some villages assign their health inspector to the job and expect him to collar strays in between inspecting restaurants. Others use whatever policeman is available, ap- parently in the belief that anyone can be a "dog catcher."

Gossele, a uniformed police officer as- signed full-time to animal control, thinks those suburbs are all wrong. He said it would be safer, both for the animals and the wardens, if all suburbs either employed a full-time animal warden or contracted for the services of one.

"I get respect on the job but I know these part-timers in other suburbs don't," he said. "And if you don't have the ex- perience; you are going to be scared doing this sort of thing. Show a dog you re scared and he s going to bite you."

AND his counterpart in Rol- ling Meadows, Officer Al Jurs, are or-

A volunteer at the Evanston Animal Shelter shows a young Golden Lab mix to Jason Ransom, 10, and his mother, Carol, who appear to have found the right dog. With five full-time employes, Evanston claims the largest

With five full-time employes, Evanston claims the largest

animal control in ine . ADOUt nair Or ine Yjj unclaimed strays caught last year were adopted.

a group called the Northern I- linois Animal Control Officers Associa- tion. Forty wardens from suburbs in Cook, Du Page, and Lake counties came to the group s last meeting and heard a veterinarian lecture on first aid for animals.

"The part-timers who come are amazed at what they don't know about animals or about the equipment they should have, but don't," Gossele said.

* Jurs and Gossele are trying to set up a training program for wardens that would include a two-week course at the Ameri- can Humane Association's new training academy at Lincoln, Logan County.

"We've got to get away from the old 'dog catcher' image," said Jurs. "Too often people think we do what we do because we re too old or incompetent to do anything else.'

AT FIRST glance the animal control problem in the suburbs looks like child s play compared to the situation in Chicago.

City animal control officers capture about 100 dogs every day. More than 20,000 were picked up in 1976. Owners claimed some of those and some were adopted, but 13,000 had to be destroyed.

In the suburbs there aren't as many unclaimed .

Evanston, one of Chicago's biggest and most urbanized suburbs, caught 593 dogs last year, according to Bill Andrews, chief warden.

With five full-time employes, Evanston claims the largest animal control effort in the suburbs. It even has its own munic- ipal animal shelter. Most suburbs con- tract to keep captured dogs in humane society or private kennels.

Andrews said strays are rare in Evanston, but his men have their hands full rounding up dogs whose own- ers let them run unattended.

EVANSTON WARDENS also write tickets on owners who walk their dogs in parks, beaches, and schoolyards, or who fail to have a utensil for picking up dog waste.

"Our biggest problem is stray cats," Andrews said, since people have fewer reservations about dumping cats on the street than they, do about dogs.

His men picked up 198 unowned cats last year, up 54 per cent from the year before, and with an active trapping pro- gram they hope to catch 30 to 40 per cent more in 1978.

Andrews and other animal experts blame the growing number of abandon- ments on the popularity of guard dogs, and on ignorance about the time, pa- tience, and cost required to properly maintain a pet.

No fewer than 351 owners simply turn-

Dennis Gossele, an animal control officer, attempts to coax a reluctant stray. Doberman te come with him. Gossele, of Glenview, believes all suburbs should have a full-time animal warden.

ed over their dogs to the Evanston pound last year.

About half of those were eventually taken in by another home. But even that course is better than dumping a dog in a forest preserve, since only about 10 per cent of the "dumped" animals survive.

THE SECURITY dog fad has had other. effects.

"We're getting more large dogs than small dogs," Andrews said. "We call

them junkyard shepherds."

Andrews said his crew is keeping up with the number of animal complaints that pour in each day, but he wonders what suburbs without a single lull-time warden are doing.

"Most suburbs don't have the staff or equipment to deal with the problem," le Saidl.

Perhaps they should, because there is plenty of evidence that abandoned ani- mals are a menace to public health.